Oh, pa-lease. Are you kidding me, digital marketing agency Not Like Other Girls?! You’re wondering what grumpy perspective I have for you this time, you might already have a fair idea of what I’m going to beat my drum about but if you haven’t, stay a while, this won’t take long.
(That’s a lie. My blog posts are always long.)
Do you do this?
Do you look at your LinkedIn profile views, and if you do, do you derive a thrill from it? It’s no lottery win that’s for sure but it is mildly exciting. I like to look at those who are looking at me, a sort of reciprocated voyeurism. That probably makes me a pervert but as it’s legal and no one’s getting hurt, I’m comfortable with that.
I am a nosy bastard so the incognito views piss me off. I get it, there are reasons why people look at LinkedIn profiles anonymously: a biggie is they want to hire you. If they tease me with a company name, I google it.
And let me tell you, I am seldom——SELDOM impressed when I ‘experience’ their websites. Sure, one man’s perfect website is another man’s shit sandwich, and I’ll concede, my own offering isn’t going to be hitting the spot for everyone who visits. But for me, the most standout thing about these websites is how un-standout they are, which is a shame because that’s what they seem to be aiming for.
Being the same is not a crime.
You can’t contrive outlier vibes. So why try to be a maverick when you’re not doing anything particularly different?
Perhaps you don’t have a unique selling proposition, and I reckon that’s fine if you’re providing an excellent service and you’re consistently finding clients. Whatever it is that you’re doing is working, bugger everything else. But if you are similar to your competition——in all the practical ways, your website message might be at odds with the realities of how you do business. If that’s the case, you’re not being honest, and clients hate that.
>>An honest business: are you running one?<<
Creative agencies are the worst.
This bunch loves to say they’re Not Like Other Girls.
Side note: for those wondering, Not Like Other Girls is a trope. It refers to women/girls who want validation and acceptance from men. And for them to get that, they will say they’re not into things women and girls are traditionally into. For example, they drink beer, play video games and watch football, whilst also being seriously hot and sexually available. See also the Cool Girl trope.
I was snooping through the homepage of one recently. This sentence nearly had my eye out:
“[REDACTED COMPANY NAME] are changing the way Marketing and Digital Agencies are growing and operating.”
That’s pretty amazing but is it true?
I searched hard (hard-ish) to find out how they did that. I wanted a summary, a single line or paragraph but nothing——nada. And despite the overwhelming animated graphics and throbbing CTA buttons (yes, they pulsed, compelling me to touch one, presumably), there wasn’t a single thing about their website that was giving off ‘different’ or ‘other’. If they were leading change, I had no idea how.
Because I enjoy this so much, I googled another agency that took a glance at my profile, and this was on their homepage:
“Today’s never-seen-before challenges need new thinking.”
More from the Not Like Other Girl’s playbook. “New thinking” suggests a unique not-before-tried way of solving problems.
(But all I was thinking was please make these rolling images stop. The text was also moving from right to left. There was so much movement that I experienced motion sickness. Is it too much to ask that companies keep their content still as I try to read their bullshit?)
>>Creative agency’s website a surrealist concept<<
God loves a trier.
Verily I say unto you, he/she/they loves it when we try but no one loves a try-hard.
I think digital agencies and creatives generally believe clients expect ‘trendy’. But do clients really want that? Don’t they just want results? Don’t they crave clarity? Coz aside from the funky-looking websites (that don’t load correctly), the business behaviour is just like All The Other Girls. If you say you’re different but can’t simply express what makes you different aren’t you just a funky-looking website (that doesn’t load correctly)?
No, I don’t have an irony deficiency.
“Not Like Other Girls is literally your schtick, Sarah.”
Yes, you got me banged to rights. Not Like Other Girls was literally, like LITERALLY the snippet title on my homepage. But it’s a piss-take. I’m just having a little fun with internalised misogyny, and at the same time, poking fun at my own industry——such lols!
>>Learn to write content like a psychopath<<
But really, I do understand.
I drone on about brand polarisation and how we should try our best to not be a boring business bastard. My tone is what some would describe as ‘edgy’ *vomits into lap*. Some might even say it’s contrived purely as a cynical ploy to swindle/make a fucking living. The truth is, none of how I write takes effort. It’s just me, however unbelievable/detestable that may seem.
The bottom line.
Your difference should be easy to notice. It shouldn’t be like trying to find a chocolate finger in a cesspit. Instead of purporting to be different, why not just be good?
Does your website traffic suck?
Book a >>FREE website audit<<